


I've Been Hurt Before

by Crowley_Winchester



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: Freak Family - Freeform, M/M, Post-Season/Series 03, past relationship
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-05
Updated: 2017-07-06
Packaged: 2018-11-28 05:26:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,377
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11411163
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crowley_Winchester/pseuds/Crowley_Winchester
Summary: After Oswald extracted his revenge, he moved back to the manor, his freaks following suit. As Oswald thinks up a new course of action now that he has extracted his revenge, the freaks start to come closer together, changing the course of their lives forever.





	1. Reminders

A man reaching out. A name on his lips. Desperation in his eyes. These were the things Victor took notice of as he gazed into the ice block before him. It had certainly not been easy to move the imprisoned Edward Nygma into the manor, but now that the job was done, Victor was at a loss as to what to do. Oswald had entrusted him with the task of guarding over Ed, believing that the frozen man would be able to fix anything that went wrong. In fact, the Penguin had only just left, taking in the sight of his once crush encased in ice before leaving, the ginger girl following closely behind. Ivy, Victor believed, was her name. With a sigh, the man broke his gaze away and got to work, closing the doors of the freezer and turning down the temperature as low as it would go. After a couple minutes, he felt satisfied enough to take off his chest plate and gloves and sit down with a sigh, leaving his gun on the tabletop provided for him. Victor looked back at Ed before turning away, burying his head in his hands. How did he get himself into something like this? Victor had always tried to be a good man. Those people he killed, he killed in an effort to save millions of lives in the future. To save his beloved Nora. But how many years of the man's life behind him would be sucked away before Oswald allowed him to be unfrozen? Five? Ten? Every day that passed with Ed in the block of ice would be on Victor's shoulders. Perhaps Oswald was right, and Nygma had deserved it, but Victor was far from a vigilante. He should never have left his igloo. A small sob escaped from the man before he choked it back, hearing footsteps in the hall. Victor scraped away the ice that had been forming around his tear ducts just as his new employer entered, this time unaccompanied by the girl.

"Oh, Victor. You have no idea how pleased I am with your work," Oswald said with a grin, closing the door behind him before moving up to the ice block and resting his hand against it. "I couldn't have asked for more from you." He turned around to the other, only to notice the bright red eyes. "Are you alright? Were you...crying?"

Victor grunted out a "no," turning his back to the other and fiddling with the table. "The..heat. Makes my eyes run." Even to Victor's own ears, it was a terrible-sounding lie. Nora had always teased him that he was too good to be able to pull off a lie. As his thoughts drifted back to his dead wife, the scientist's lip started to tremble before he bit down on it. There was no way he would allow himself to cry in front of anyone, least of all Oswald. Then he would have to explain himself, and Nora was far too personal to discuss with a man like this.

Oswald raised an eyebrow, but didn't comment. Back when he had been looking through files that had been recovered from Indian Hill, he had stumbled upon Fries'. He recalled the report, how he had been an excellent doctor, both with his knowledge and his enjoyment with working from patients. But he closed his practice when his wife fell ill, spending all of his time and money desperately trying to save her before he accidentally killed her, then failing to kill himself. "A friend of mine once told me that the pain of memories don't last forever. He was right." Oswald looked up at Ed again, no longer triumphant, but merely sad. "It also helps to have distractions. Perhaps you would-"

"You say the pain doesn't last forever. If it doesn't, then why do you bother going after this man? You loved him and then hated him. Perhaps in time you could've learned to forgive him, for whatever happened between you two." Victor turned around to look at Oswald, only to receive a strike across the face and to have his shirt grabbed, his face being pulled towards the seething man before him. 

"How dare you, when I was trying to comfort you-"

"Oswald."

"You have to start acting like you know everything about this-"

"Oswald."

"For Pete's sake Victor, will you shut your mouth already?! I am not finished speaking."

"You're getting frost bite."

Oswald stared at the blue-tinted man across from him blankly before looking down at his hands, letting out a shriek as he noticed the painfully red colour. In his fury, he hadn't even noticed the numbing chill creeping up his fingers.

Victor stood up and briskly left the room, returning minutes later with a pot of warm water and bandages. There was far too much colour to the man's cheeks, and one of his hands was almost normal coloured. "Put your hands in there," he muttered as he shut the door and put back on his chest plate and gloves, clutching the almost normal looking hand to his chest.

Oswald did as he was told, not without a questioning stare that Victor was unintentionally ignoring, too focused on trying to cool himself down. A pounding down the stairs caught both of their attentions, and they turned to the door as Ivy flung the door open, heaving for breath. "Ivy, what are you doing here? Did something happen?"

She held up a hand, panting, before looking over at Victor. "Heard...scream," Ivy wheezed out before slowly straightening up and brushing the hair out of her face. "I sprinted up here all the way from the greenhouse, and Bridget was just laughing in the kitchen. Did she hurt you?"

Victor shook his head, looking down at the floor as a shy blush coated his face and neck. "I checked the water temperature with my hand. Habit," he muttered, gesturing to the warm water that Oswald's hands were currently in. Ivy looked between the two before Oswald huffed loudly, standing up and shaking off his hands. 

"I'm surrounded by idiots," he muttered, limping past Ivy and heading towards his room. Before Ivy could follow him to get all the details, a hand stopped her from leaving.

"Make sure you put these bandages on his hands. The wound needs time to heal. I would do it by myself, but..." Victor held up his hands and wiggled his fingers, displaying how thick the gloves were on his hands before placing the roll of bandages in the girl's hands. Ivy nodded, and after a moment of staring down at him in sympathy, she left, closing the door behind her. Victor stared at the door before turning around, looking at Ed. For a moment, he had the urge to unfreeze the man, to get the answers he wanted about Oswald's past. But Victor merely sighed and moved his chair away from Edward, pulling out a book in boredom.


	2. Expectations

Ivy held the bandages tightly in her hands, following closely behind Oswald as he limped through the halls until he reached his bedroom. As he shrugged off his coat and pulled off his tie, Ivy sat down on the edge of the bed and started swinging her feet. "Ozzie, what happened? Your hands look absolutely terrible."

Oswald sighed, rolling his eyes as he sat down next to Ivy. "Victor was being an idiot, and I forgot how cold he was." He displayed his hands to the girl, frowning down at them.

"I'm sure everything was an accident," Ivy soothed, looking over his hands for a moment before getting up. "I'll be right back, I think I might just have the thing for you." She hurried down to the greenhouse, passing Bridget flipping through the television channels on her way. The girl took in a deep breath as she opened the glass doors, a smile not being able to help itself as it crept along her face. Already, she had started making the greenhouse her own, adding in her own hybrid plants and replanting the already existing ones outside. Reaching out, Ivy plucked a few leaves from different plants before going over to her work table, grinding them up into a paste. With a proud smile, the girl rushed back upstairs to Oswald's side. On the way, however, Ivy couldn't help but open up the freezer, giving Victor a thumbs up and a smile before closing the door again. "See? Back in no time."

"Took you long enough," Oswald replied, though the bite in his words was utterly ignored by the girl. He offered out his hands to her, flinching as he felt her touch them. "That hurts!"

"Of course it does, Oswald, your hands are close to having frostbite! They're going to be sensitive for a while. Maybe next time, you can be nicer to Victor. He seems nice," Ivy chided, rubbing the green salve over the violently red skin. "You promise you told Bridget to be nicer to him? They were terrible to each other before."

"Yes, Ivy. They got into a fight at Arkham or something, I didn't go after the details. I think she just wanted to even the score with him." 

The younger girl shook her head, letting go of Oswald's hands to grab the bandages. "We're a family now. We should start acting like one," she muttered, wrapping Oswald's hands securely.

Oswald looked up from his hands to Ivy, a patronizing smile on his face. "We're not a family. Victor and Bridget work for me, and there's enough rooms here that they can stay. I have no intention of trying to start a family, with anyone, let alone them."

The hurt on her face was obvious for anyone to read, and Ivy tied the bandages off a little too tightly before getting up and quickly leaving, slamming the door behind her. She ignored the man calling out after her as she hurried downstairs to her greenhouse, wiping away the tears that had started to form. She had been hoping that this was going to be a real chance to start something she couldn't even remember. The streets had been her home for a long time, and though she found a friend in Selina, she had wanted more than that now. Oswald was protecting her, Bridget was a great friend, and Victor's cold exterior was nothing like his personality. Ivy sat down hard on a bench and burst into tears, crossing her arms on the table and burying her face in them. She just wanted to belong somewhere, why was that so hard for everyone to understand? The girl flinched as she felt an arm around her shoulders, looking up to see the scarred face of Bridget, looking down at her with a small smile.

"You want to tell me what's going on?" She vaguely remembered the Pepper girl, Selena had introduced the pair once. From what she remembered, the girl wasn't anything special, but still remarkably younger than they were. "I won't tell either of the guys. It can just be between us."

Ivy nodded, trying to wipe off her face even as the tears kept streaming down. "I-I just wanted....another chance, you know? Something normal. I mean, we don't have to be perfect or anything. Just...our own family." She sniffled again, but the tears seemed to be slowing down now, though that did nothing to stop her bottom lip trembling.

Bridget shushed her, rubbing her back in steady circles. "I know what you mean. I had a family, but...they weren't exactly the best." Her lip curled as she remembered her brothers, a feeling of satisfaction arising again from their demise. "Listen, we've done some stuff together. I think we can stay together in the long run, you know?"

"But Oswald said-"

"Oh, come off it Ivy. He's said a lot of things, you don't need to take them all so seriously. Besides, maybe he just doesn't like the label. I don't know what you know, but I don't know a lot about his past. I just know that he comes from hard pasts, like the lot of us. We're stronger together, he'd be an idiot to not see that. You just gotta wait for him to come around, that's all."

With another sniffle, Ivy turned into Bridget and squeezed the other girl tightly. "Thank you for being such a good friend." She pulled away, a small smile on her face as she stood up and went over to a plant tucked away in the back of the greenhouse. "I was going to wait to give this to you, but...here." Ivy brought back a pot, and the flowers coming off of the plant inside were absolutely gorgeous. Deep crimson, with black streaks on the outside of the flower, and a gold blooming in the center. "Surprise! I made them for you, because look!" All of her sadness gone, Ivy took a lighter from her pocket and lit it, holding it under a flower. "They're fireproof!" She smiled proudly, putting the lighter away before holding the plant out to Bridget again. 

Bridget took the pot and held it close to her chest, a shy smile stretching across her face. She couldn't remember the last time that someone had actually given her a present. "It's perfect, Ivy."

"Well, plants are my thing, and I know fire is yours! Here, come take a look." Ivy lead Bridget to the back of the greenhouse, and showed off a series of dark blue and purple plants. "I'm trying to create a flower that could handle Victor's cold temperatures. That's a lot harder. For yours, I've been slowly introducing multiple fireproof chemicals, as well as using some parts of cactus flowers to help handle the temperature. But plants just aren't meant to survive his temperatures...I think I'll get it eventually though!"

Bridget nodded and smiled again at Ivy, feeling a growing affection towards the other. Then again, it was only a matter of time. The girl was just too sweet to not win over anyone. She continued to nod as Ivy excitedly explained further about her plants, feeling that she had found a real friend at last.


End file.
